Sunshine
by Silverwind24
Summary: Wesley’s grief finally becomes too much for Illyria to bear, and she makes a decision that will bring hope to the hopeless, and life to the dead.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Sunshine   
Author: silverwind24   
Summary: Wesley's grief finally becomes too much for Illyria to bear, and she makes a decision that will bring hope to the hopeless, and life to the dead.   
Rating: PG-13 (for a very vague innuendo)   
Disclaimer: If I owned even a tiny bit of Angel, Wes and Fred never would have died! Author's Note: Please read and review!  
  
Chapter 1  
  
Wesley slept with his door cracked open, like a child who needed light to keep the monsters away. Yet, this futile attempt did nothing to alleviate the man from his demons, the torrents of unavailing grief that plagued him night and day. Regardless of his privacy or the hour of the night, she blew the door open with barely a touch of her hand and stood there, watching him. She watched the rise and fall of his chest, the sweat that trickled over his brow, and the way he clutched the white sheets in his trembling hands. She saw the emotions fly over his face, sometimes flickering there like a flame in the wind. First, hope, then confusion, fear, and a sudden onslaught of sadness that tugged at sometime inside of her as she watched. As the sleeping man grew more frantic, his lips moved, quietly whispering something at first, and then increasing in volume. The fallen goddess need not have listened to hear what the man would say.  
  
"Fred...Fred...oh God...Fred," he mumbled, shaking his head, his voice still sleepy and muddled. Illyria tipped her head to the side, watching intently, but unmoving.  
"Please...stay...oh Fred," his voice got louder, and then lost all control and dignity that he might have held to him when he spoke as he called her name. Yet, his own voice did not wake him, and he almost thrashed, kicking at the blanket that covered him, and it was too much for her to take.  
Illyria lifted up her head and the blue pigment faded from her skin, her hair lightened, and her eyes became the doe-like brown that Fred's had been. In a perfect imitation of her voice, tone, and expression, she breathed, "Oh Wes," and went to him.  
At the moment that her hand touched his arm, he was aware of her, but remained sleeping. In the nightmare that had become agonizingly real and blurred all senses of reality, the woman that he loved came to him, not the ancient goddess that now inhabited her broken body. She surrounded him, comforting him with the lovely voice he had longed to hear, and touching him with her soft, perfect skin. Wesley kissed her and held her, not stopping even when he woke, feverishly believing in the waking dream that Illyria had created to ebb his pain. He said her name again and again like it was a sacred word, and she responded to him as only Fred could. Tears dripped from his face onto hers, half from the joy of having her in his arms, and the others from the subconscious knowledge of her death. Illyria took it all in, the emotions she felt startling and awakening her, realizing that she was no longer in control of her feelings for this man, for Wesley. Slipping back into sleep, clutching her to him so much that it almost hurt, he whispered, "Don't go Fred."  
"I won't leave ya, Wes," she told him, in a voice that was not her own, before sleep overcame her.  
  
Wesley Wyndam-Pryce woke the next morning with a sense of inexplicable happiness. Then he became aware of the woman in his arms, and he almost convulsed in his confusion.  
"Morning sunshine," she said to him, and he wanted so badly to let his face melt into a smile. Instead, he swore loudly and pushed her aside with a violence that he didn't know he possessed. He screamed as loudly as he could, tumbling out of the bed, raising his voice in a wail that was more animal than human. He continued to scream, unable to look at her, and unable to contain his pure rage. He cursed her in every language that he knew, both demonic and human. He shook his head in disbelief, clutching at his hair with his fingers, then staggering helplessly around the room.  
She lay there on the floor, still utterly Fred, watching every emotion flow unmeasured from him. In a moment of Fred-like self-conscious, she pulled the bed sheet around her body, still watching him.  
He picked up a coffee mug in a shaking hand and flung it at his mirror with all his strength, shattering it, letting the sounds of crashing and destruction join the chorus of his sorrow. After every shard of glass had settled to its resting place, he stood there, looking at her. Shaking his head again slightly he began to sob, sinking to his knees.  
"I told you never to be her."  
The tears ran unchecked down his face, and the violent rage that had consumed him moments before was replaced by despair.  
"Why did you have to be her?"  
She rose, the sheet around her, and knelt beside Wesley as he fell apart in a way that he had never allowed himself to before.  
"I love you, Wes."  
"No. No. No. No!" His face hardened again and he grabbed her wrist, squeezing it so hard that she cried out. "How dare you? You're not her! You can never be her, you filth; you desecrate everything that we had! You lead me to believe...oh God... what have you done?"  
She looked at him, the hurt in her eyes, tears on her face.  
"Stop it. Stop it now, Illyria. You don't know what you have done. Be blue, don't be her," he commanded, as harsh and cruel as he had ever been.  
She didn't change.  
"Illyria, stop. Be blue, don't be her, I can't stand it." Something in his voice wavered again, and when she didn't change, he broke. He let go of her wrist and sobbed like no man should ever sob. His forehead pressed against the side of his bed, his arm wrapped around his head as if to shield him from everything, he rocked slightly, the sobs continuing as if he could never stop.  
Illyria touched her hand to his shoulder, and he jerked away, looking at her with a new level of insanity in his red and swollen eyes.  
"You would give anything to bring her back," she said, in her own voice. He stopped crying long enough to nod.  
"There is a way."  
"What?" He sat up suddenly, aware and almost collected, except for the hiccupping sobs that returned involuntarily to his throat.  
"There is a way you can have your Fred back, Wesley. This," she gestured to her face and body, "Is not enough for you. You love her soul."  
"That is not possible. Her soul was destroyed." He wiped his wet and reddened visage with the back of his hand.  
She smiled as Fred would, using her voice. "Don't be silly. Matter cannot be created or destroyed. The soul is matter, science has proved that as well."  
"Don't," he warned her, looking physically pained.  
"Her soul was altered from the form that it was in her body when the resurrection occurred. But the particles that composed it still exist, they are merely scattered throughout this world. I am surprised that this did not occur to you earlier."  
"Why do you tell me this, Illyria? What use is it to you? Do you plan to bribe me or bargain with me by using her as a promise, keeping her hostage?" He spat the words almost coldly.  
"For one so intelligent, by human standards, you miss so much. There is nothing here for me, Wesley, except for you. And all you want is her." There was something in her voice that he had never heard before. Was it regret? Disappointment?  
"I still cannot understand."  
"Then you are not meant to. Do you want her back or not?"  
"Yes."  
"Then we must go." In an instant, she was blue and leather-clad, and she rose, leaving him there on the floor.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: "Sunshine"  
  
Later, Wesley could not recall how he found himself in his lab that morning, with Illyria waiting for him, standing with her back to the door. She turned her head when he entered, giving him a piercing look with her downcast eyes.  
"Good. Now you must read the incantation. I've readied it for you." He thought he heard something waver in her voice, but he wasn't quite sure.  
"Illyria, I still don't understand why you are doing this. What is in it for you?"  
She laughed, a caustic, sharp sound that made Wesley cringe. "What's in it for me? Emptiness, quiet, release. Death. Death awaits me, and nothing more."  
"Then why do you do it?"  
"Because there's nothing for me here either. I can never be part of this world, just as I can never be part of your world. Only a thorn in your side, a painful reminder of what you lost, and an uncontrollable variable that threatens to tear apart everything with the wave of a hand."  
"Illyria...."  
"Speak no more. Only minutes before you called for my demise. Now you will be rid of me, and your lovely Winifred will be in your arms again." She turned away, and he blinked hard to clear his thoughts.  
"Fine. Fine. Now, I don't understand how a simple spell can assemble a soul and return it to its body. Didn't you say that the particles were scattered throughout the entire world?"  
"I did say that. But so much of her soul remains here, clinging to me, clinging to you. Can you not feel it? It is all in this place, it refuses to leave. That makes it simpler."  
Wesley looked around, as if he could see her and feel her there. He imagined that he could, still trying to deal with the idea of having her back with him, his most ardent desire. There was still the extremely valid possibility that Illyria was lying, or toying with him, things she did quite often, with the ignominy of last night still painfully on his mind. Nevertheless, he approached the book that Illyria had opened for him, wondering where she had gotten it from, and how she had known which pages to turn to. He scanned the words over with his eyes, checking to see if some fouler intent had provoked her to ask this of him.  
"What the hell," he said aloud. He might as well read it. The language was something archaic and illegible to him, but it was most certainly a derivative of common demonic tongues, so he was able to understand the general meaning of words and phrases. His mind translated and he read the words as his hands trembled.  
  
"Be gone ye who inhabits unwanted here  
Return to the hell that birthed you.  
And welcome back the one that belongs,  
Gather the broken pieces that will assemble the vessel  
And set them together until they make the whole."  
  
"Are you going to read it or not?" Illyria's voice forced Wesley to lift his head to look at her, where she stood, her arms wrapped around herself, looking ill at ease for the first time since she had come to him.  
  
"Why are you condemning yourself? Why are you allowing me to do this?"  
"Do not ask questions for which you already know the answers. Read it before I change my mind and kill you." Wesley could see that no words could have been more insincere. "Why do you hesitate? Bring her back, Wesley, it is what you want."  
"It is." He thought of Fred, smiling, beautiful, the most important thing. He had lost her. And he would have done anything to bring her back. So placing his finger below the first word in the spell, he began to read, his voice strong and clear.  
Seconds after he had begun to read, something changed in the air of the lab, the glassware began to shake, slightly at first, and then more violently. Regardless, he continued reading, his voice increasing in volume and intensity.  
Illyria braced herself against the impact of the spell, first only feeling the otherworldly power passing over her, and then with a violent thrust of invisible energy, it was upon her, the spell taking a firm and unrelenting grasp on her very essence. She screamed. She couldn't help it. The pain was horrible, worse than she could have imagined, and she raised her voice against it, falling to the ground in agony. She heard Wesley hesitate as he read the spell, and she raised a hand that seemed to be made of lead to urge him on. Looking at her, inexplicably and impossibly concerned, he faltered, but continued. The moment that he began to speak again, the pain rolled over her like a wave, grasping at her very soul, grinding, and biting into it, destroying her. Finally, after an eternity of never-ending agony, Illyria felt her grasp on the world begin to slip away, and the darkness close in on her. She was dimly aware of Wesley crouched over her.  
"Fred? Fred?" he asked, taking her in his arms.  
"She comes," Illyria said; a little more than a breathy gasp.  
"Oh God, Illyria, how can this be right?" he said, suddenly feeling remorse.  
"Wesley, the last time you held her in your arms... I was doing the very same thing to her," she whispered, each breath painful.  
He opened his mouth to speak, paused, and then said; "You were not acting like yourself, at the end."  
"I was not. I became too human. That's why-" she gasped, and arched her back in a final death shudder, and she sighed against the pain. "That's why I started to love you."  
"Dear God!" he exclaimed.  
"She's coming.... Be happy, Wesley," she said, and then died.  
For one horrible moment, Fred's body was still in his arms, and Wesley thought frantically that he had lost them both. He had his eyes closed tightly; the only sound his own ragged breathing.  
"Wesley?"  
His eyes snapped open, he looked down, and she was there, in his arms, looking up at him with her big, beautiful brown eyes.  
"Fred? Is it you, sweetheart?"  
"It's me, Wes," she smiled, and he knew it was. That smile, that warm glow in her eyes, it couldn't be imitated. He allowed himself to smile at her for a moment before choking back a sob and holding her close in his arms. Her hands clutched weakly at the sleeves of his shirt, her voice muffled by the folds of fabric.  
"I'm sorry, Fred. I haven't hurt you?" he helped her sit up, still in his arms, and at that moment he swore that he would never let her go.  
"No, never. Just, Wes, I can't remember... I was alone, so alone, and so cold. But I knew that you would come.... But I don't understand how you did it." She looked at him questioningly, and he just stared back into her beautiful face, watching each tiny movement with wonder and joy.  
"Does it really even matter? You were lost to me forever, and now we're together again." He felt another tear roll unchecked down his cheek.  
"Don't cry, Wes, I can't take it. I'm so sorry; I've hurt you so badly. But I'm so tired, so very tired," she said quietly, and sighed back into his arms.  
"Just rest, sweet. It's all right. Everything will be fine, it's all right," he whispered to her, and she smiled faintly, curling her head against his chest. He pressed his lips against her hair, just holding her close, unable to believe how blessed he was.  
"Wes?"  
"Hmmm?"  
"Sing me a song?"  
"What song, Fred?"  
"You know which one," she smiled, her eyes still closed, each breath that she took coming easily, causing her chest to rise and fall gently, and her eyelids to flutter slightly.  
He smiled back at her, taking a measured breath, and began to sing their song in his untrained, but still pleasant, baritone. "You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy when skies are gray. You'll never know, dear, how much I love you, please don't take my sunshine away."  
Wesley sat there in silence, the woman he loved more than his own life nestled safely in his arms, and his chest swollen with uncontainable, indescribable emotions. He leaned in to kiss Fred's forehead tenderly, pressing his lips there for no more than a moment, but knowing that he would hold that instant in his mind forever.

Note: Please review! Thank you so much! Where do I go from here? wink


End file.
